Converting to single speed - A budget DIY project... almost

The first time I laid eyes on this old mountain bike I knew I wanted to converted it into a single speed. When the time was right I would take this project on. I was determined to do
as much of the restoration as possible.

But the story doesn't start here. Two and half years ago, my wife and I left for Beijing on a 7 month cycle trip through Asia and South East Asia. We had sourced old steel frame mountain bikes with very basic components, and had a few alterations done to prepare them for a loaded journey across the unknown. The bike I had used for this adventure was the one I was going to restore.

Upon our return the bikes sat outside on our balcony, neglected. It took a friend of mine, who had recently sourced parts and rebuilt a Bianchi road bike from his youth, to motivate me to get this process under way. I wanted to be part of the restoration process rather than handing over an old bike and wait excitedly for the bike mechanic to work his magic and transform it into something special.
This is an overview of the process I went through to renovate and transform my old mountain bike into a single speed commuter bike.

- Step One -

Remove all the parts from the frame. I was taking pictures of the parts that I was removing and how they were attached, just in case I couldn't put it back together.
Next, remove the paint from the frame, fork and other parts that will be reused. I used a paint stripper and applied a generous amount (it's not ideal when this liquid splashes on bare skin. It burns!). After applying 2 coats and waiting 40 minutes, the paint blisters. Using a paint scraper and wire brush, I removed the paint. It's easy to remove 80% of the paint, but the last 20% requires patience and some fine grain sand paper.

- Step Two -

Cleaning and repainting the existing parts. There was a fair bit of rust which I had to sand away, but fortunately it was just surface rust. I didn't remove the spokes on my wheels, so I had to mask them off before spraying the rims.
Then there were a few parts I wanted to change for various reasons. I swapped out my old handle bars for a straight pair, and trimmed them a bit. Bought a shorter handle bar stem and some new brake levers.

After removing the paint from the frame, front fork and crank arms, I dropped them off with Jamie

from Ubuntu Bikes who sprayed the frame burnt orange and the front fork and crank arms satin black. Thanks Jamie, you did a fantastic job!

Once I put the bike together I sent it to Nils at Woodstock Cycleworks to make some final tweaks and convert it from a regular geared mountain bike to a single speed. We chose a 2.75:1 ratio with the front chain ring having 44 teeth and the rear cog having 17 teeth. I will be using this bike to cycle along a flat road, that is how we determined the ratio.
Since there was a large gap where the cassette was, Nils used spacers to fill it and made sure the chain ran in a straight line between the two. Brilliant job Nils!

It was a fun project to work on and I'm very happy with the way it turned out.